Phonemaker HTC intends to breed new attitudes about data privacy, with a little help from some feline friends. The company announced on Tuesday that a game called CryptoKitties will come to HTC devices starting with the HTC U12 Plus. The game, which ...and more »

Phonemaker HTC intends to breed new attitudes about data privacy, with a little help from some feline friends.The company announced on Tuesday that a game called CryptoKitties will come to HTC devices starting with the HTC U12 Plus. The game, which lets you collect and even "sire" one-of-a-kind virtual cats, is based on blockchain technology. CryptoKitties is based on blockchain principles.CryptoKittiesNormally, blockchain is used to form the backbone of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, but the technology can also create a trustworthy digital paper trail of who owns what. That chain of custody can potentially help verify the identity of priceless artifacts or works of art -- or, in the case of the CryptoKitties game, digital furballs.But here's the interesting thing: Although HTC is the first major brand to announce a phone based around the blockchain technology that makes Bitcoin and cryptocurrency red-hot, the first phone that CryptoKitties will come to isn't a "cryto" phone. The U12 Plus is a mass-market device.

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The Finney phone, made by iPhone-manufacture Foxconn, is the first blockchain phone to be announced so far.HTC says that CryptoKitties will be the first of a broader app store based on games that use blockchain technology. The goal is to build up an ecosystem of blockchain-based apps specifically for this community.

CryptoKittiesHTC's dedicated blockchain device, the HTC Exodus, will arrive some time in Q3 for some amount of money, though the sale date and price are still to be announced. You can, however, sign up for HTC Exodus alerts online. The Exodus phone will have a cold storage wallet for keeping cryptocurrency offline, and a way to recover lost or corrupted keys (the cryptographic key that makes everything secure). Read now: What's blockchain? Everything you need to knowRead next: Bitcoin, Ethereum or Litecoin: Which is best for you?